Anyone who has not yet responded on the local plan needs to do so by 5pm Monday. You can email localplan@welhat.gov.uk

If you wish to object to site HS22 (previously BrP4), (which is the site just the otherside of the railway bridge, where 250 dwellings are proposed) there are some points below that you might want to include. Please feel free to copy and paste - but I strongy recomend you amend to use your own words where possible, adding and removing points and changing the priority to reflect your own thoughts. The council are not very positive about multiple identical responses.

Many thanks to the North Mymms Parish Green Belt Society for most of the points below. The points in blue are in addition to the their list:

Response to Local Plan – Policy SADM31From:Your name:Your address:I am writing to object to the inclusion of HS22in the Local Plan.The Council previously excluded the site (then BrP4) for the following reason:

It makes a significant contribution to the Green Belt purpose of protecting the countryside and has a low capacity to accommodate landscape change.

The existing Green Belt boundary is strongly defined by the railway and development of the site would result in a weaker Green Belt boundary.

Access to the village would be via a bridge over the railway and there is currently uncertainty about the viability of achieving suitable pedestrian access between site and village

These reasons have not changed, so it is very surprising that the site is now included in the plan.

This site should be excluded, and development should never be allowed on the site for the following additional reasons:Imapct on local areas:

It is detached from Brookmans Park village by the railway

Creation of new access and traffic measures would change nature of road from rural to semi-urban

It requires significant highways upgrades and would require footpath improvements along the length of the site

Significant highway safety concerns Bradmore Lane and Warrengate Road are inadequate width to serve a development of this size. Used by pedestrians, cyclists and horse riders. There are no footpaths

Access to the village would be significantly impacted during development, with detrimental impact on local businesses and residents

Heavy vehicles accessing the development site would be forced to come through Brookmans Park village (over the railway bridge), through Welham Green (via Station Road) and/or through Water End (via the very narrow Bradmore Lane). All these access points would cause severe congestion, danger to local road users and significant impact on residents.

Such a large and dense estate (250 houses) on the edge of the village would change the overall rural feel of the village.

Pollution and flooding:

Landscape is assessed as having high sensitivity and low capacity to accommodate change

There is no current infrastructure, including flood water management, to support the number of new dwellings proposed.

Increased flood risk to Water End

The site is within an inner ground source protection zone with effect on Swallow Holes SSS1

Mitigation may be necessary to minimise any risk of pollution

High density development next to flood plain - Flood Zone 3 along southern boundary

Green Belt Impact

Assessed by WHBC as having a high degree of visual openness

The Green Belt boundary would be significantly weakened

Assessed by WHBC as Significant for Green Belt local purposes to prevent coalescence between settlements (the site makes a significant contribution towards the gap between Brookmans Park and Welham Green)

Encroachment – Assessed by WHBC as Significant for Green Belt National purpose

Impact on Wildlife Sites and important rural/conservation areas:

Adjacent to Wildlife Site (WS144) part of which is an Ancient Woodland

Within 250m of Potterells Wood Wildlife site (WS145)

Lies within 10km of a Special Area of Conservation

It is part of the Watling Chase Community Forest that was set up to regenerate the countryside in and around urban areas

Anyone who has not yet responded on the local plan needs to do so by 5pm Monday. You can email localplan@welhat.gov.uk

As Aqila has reminded us, there is still time to respond to the Welwyn Hatfield Borough Council Local Plan proposals. I have to admit that I left it late, sending an email this morning. It's the last chance for local residents to have their say on plans to develop the area - whether you are in favour or against - so don't miss the opportunity, unless, of course, you don't have a view.

Anyone who has not yet responded on the local plan needs to do so by 5pm Monday. You can email localplan@welhat.gov.uk

As well as responding on individual sites please consider responding to the draft Infrastructure Development Plan (IDP). This is frightening in its inadquacy - over £240million has been estimated to supply the infrastructure needed to support the 12,100 additional dwellings in the area. Sources for this money are not clear and are based on trust!!! Without a viable infrastructure plan the Local Plan itself is not viable.

As well as responding on individual sites please consider responding to the draft Infrastructure Development Plan (IDP). This is frightening in its inadquacy - over £240million has been estimated to supply the infrastructure needed to support the 12,100 additional dwellings in the area. Sources for this money are not clear and are based on trust!!! Without a viable infrastructure plan the Local Plan itself is not viable.

Interesting read. That total is £110 million less than the £350 million a week that the Brexit leave group lied would be provided, nationally, for the NHS alone.

I notice in your letter that you say the health provision set aside for Welwyn Hatfield in the IDP is £40.64m. I had a quick read through and couldn't find that figure, but I am guessing you have extrapolated it from all the other figures in there. Would that figure be a one-off or an annual amount? Can you point to the page where you arrived at that number, please?

Having had to attend a couple of hospital appointments at The Lister over recent months I can't see how this is going to help the NHS cope with caring for any more people in the area with cancellations and five hour waiting not unusual. On health grounds alone that figure seems inadequate.

I'll read through the health part again and, once I get your clarification, I'll bash off an email before the deadline. Thanks again for raising this. I've embedded the document you linked to below.

David

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The Brookmans Park Newsletter has been supporting the village and our local community since 1998 by providing free, interactive tools for all to use.

Thanks, I have made a screen grab of the relevant section (about health cost estimates) and have attached it below. I have also embedded the relevant part of the IDP (Appendix 1) about costs to help anyone else who is interested find it.

a)Contain a summary of all the 3,000 representations received in the Consultation on the Draft Local Plan Proposed Submission document, Policies Map, Sustainability Appraisal, Habitats Regulations Assessment and Draft Infrastructure Delivery Plan that took place between 30 August and 24 October 2016 and a proposed response to the issues raised.

b)Set out a schedule of minor modifications that officers propose should be made to the Plan in light of consultation representations. Minor modifications are changes to typographical or grammatical errors, changes to improve clarity or changes to update facts.

Summary

The Executive Summary in the Report Pack states that no main modifications that would amend the content or intent of the Plan are proposed and recommends that the Panel recommends to Cabinet and Council that the Local Plan, Policies Map and associated submission documents should be submitted with minor modifications to the Secretary of State for public examination.

In essence, this means that providing the Panel do not make any main modifications, the North Mymms sites to be removed from the Green Belt and developed remain the same as in the Proposed Submission Local Plan:

Many will have recieved the following via email. I thought I should post it here so we have it on record in the public discussion forum.

From: Louise St John Howe, Programme Officer, Welwyn Hatfield EiP

Dear Representor,

Following my email of 4th June, 2017 when I notified you of the Inspector’s appointment, I am now able to give you further details concerning the examination of the Welwyn Hatfield Local Plan.

Due to the complexity of the Local Plan and number of representations received the Inspector has organised the hearing sessions into four distinct sessions, and full details concerning this are available in his Guidance Notes at paras 19-28. All the hearing sessions will take place in the Council Chamber at the Welwyn Hatfield Council Offices, The Campus, Welwyn Garden City, AL6 6AE and will start at 10.00 am.

Dates for the first two stages of hearing sesions are set out below:-

Stage 1: Legal Soundness and Duty to Co-operate

Thursday 21st SeptemberFriday 22nd September

Please find attached the following documents which are relevant to Stage 1 of the hearing sessions:-

Details of the issues and questions for the hearing sessions in October and November will be sent out at the end of the first week of September

Stage 3: Topic Specific Policies

Dates to be announced

Stage 4 Settlement Policies and Site Allocations:

Dates to be announced

Please note the following deadlines for Stage 1 and Stage 2 of the hearing sessions:-

Notification of wishing to Participate:It is necessary to notify me if you wish to take part in the hearing sessions, regardless of whether you indicated previously that you wished to particpate. Full details are set out in Para 16-18 of the Inspector’s Guidance Notes.

Please view the examination documents EX02 Inspector’s Preliminary Questions, and EX04 Council’s response to Inspector’s Preliminary Questions before contacting me about participation at stage 1, because in the light of these documents you may consider that it is no longer necessary.

The deadline for hearing statements has been extended to Monday 9th October 2017 at 5.00 pm. Providing your electronic copy is with me by this deadline the 3 hard copies can be posted to me on Monday 9th October.

The Inspector has asked me to stress that all further written submissions in the Statements should only address the Issues for Examination which are set out in the Inspector’s Agenda.

The hearing sessions at Stage 2 are dealing with the over-arching strategy of the Local Plan. There will not be any discussion on individual sites at the Stage 2 hearing sessions other than by way of example. All matters relating to these will be dealt with together at the hearing sessions on site allocations in Stage 4, with the exception of Site SDS2 (WGC5), South-East of Welwyn Garden City. This is to be discussed at a joint session with representors to the adjacent site in East Hertfordshire District, probably in November.

Notification of wishing to Participate:

It is necessary to notify me if you wish to take part in the hearing sessions, regardless of whether you indicated previously that you wished to participate. Full details are set out in Para 16-18 of the Inspector’s Guidance Notes, sent with my email of 12th June, 2017. The deadline for notifying me is Monday 9th October at 5.00 pm.

If anything is unclear or you have any queries please do not hesitate to get in touch with me.

So long as ordinary folk can afford them I don't have a problem with that and 1500 homes does not sound a lot to me. What I do have an issue with is the recent properties being built in BP many of which remain unsold. This is having a knock on effect on existing planned builds as I know of several sites where permission has been given a few years ago but building has yet to start. Clearly they are waiting for favourable market conditions (which usually mend a higher margin!) but this is just one of the problems with the current system.

So long as ordinary folk can afford them I don't have a problem with that

Depends what you mean by ordinary folk! Only a small percentage of any development will actually be affordable housing - probably 10%. Developers will be pushing for this to be as low as possible because of high land values in this area and that they therefore will have 'viability' issues.

The current definition of 'affordable housing' used for planning is simply a min. 20% discount off market value subject to a price cap of £250.000.

So, probably only 10% of any development will be 'affordable' and will probably cost £250,000.

I roughly calculate that you would need to be earning approx £80.000 p.a. to get a mortgage (less any deposit that you may have been able to save)

I agree with your numbers. However we are at this point due to the failure of successive governments to build / encourage the volume of homes required that has pushed homes to such highs that they are now in a position that it is politically difficult for them to push for a material reduction in house prices (impact on pensions, rents, perceived asset values etc). Also not helped by the recent help to buy scheme which has simply maintained high house prices and provided house builders with excessive profits. £100m bonus payout for one chief exec seems bonkers to me, imagine the homes you could have been built with that.

The bottom line is that the only way to create the homes required for 'ordinary folk' is dare I say it to free up cheap greenbelt belt land thereby reducing the overall cost. Any builder can tell you that they can build a good quality detached home for around £150k and that's with a margin. Where there's a will there is a way unfortunately the current government sees the greenbelt topic as guaranteed votes particularly from the 50+ but they need to change particularly as they have now evidenced the rise of the younger voter.

However, Green Belt land will not be cheap and land owners will want their slice of the pie - although it is clearly cheaper to develop a greenfield site as opposed to a brownfield site.

Whatever price a developer pays for land is irrelevant - they will not pass this on in the final price. The market price is the market price and round here that means expensive!

I suspect that what you will actually see is a raft of executive style houses built to maximise profits and any 'affordable' housing bought by existing property owners as 'buy to lets'.

You can guarantee that those new landlords will be renting their properties at full market rent which will continue to trap potential first time buyers in the vicious circle of not being able to save for a deposit.

The only way to create the homes for 'ordinary folk' is to build social housing or what was previously known as Council houses and rent these at genuinely affordable rents.

Our Council builds about 100 pa. which is woefully short on the known need.

I don't think there is one answer but at the end of the day you cannot deny that simple economics of demand and supply will impact costs. The problem we have is that developers like to control supply and as a result they hold onto planning permission and drip feed housing at rates which help sustain inflated margins. Once again I find it bonkers that a chief exec of a house builder can earn a bonus of £100m. Profit earned off the back of vastly inflated house prices just doesn't sound right.